The Ann Richards School for Young Women Leaders

Tech Changes: ARS helps provide students with devices

An “Academic Space” poster is hung outside of a classroom as a reminder for students. These posters are seen all around school outside multiple classrooms. Photo by Alyssa Cerda.

The Ann Richards school is having new technology changes in place this year with rewriting old policies, new online classroom programs such as Blend, and providing students with their own personal laptop for the school year.

The school has had a Bring Your Own Device policy in place in past school years. This policy allows students to bring their own device, such as a smartphone, on campus to use in class for academic purposes. This policy has allowed classrooms be more phone friendly since a majority of students bring and work on their phone in academic spaces.

In this new school year students have been given the opportunity to check out a Chromebook for the year completely free. Students will be able to pick up their Chromebook at Back to School Night, checking it out with their guardian present to assure each student has a device that the school approves of to use on campus.

The use of Chromebooks would help end the need for phones in classrooms which makes teachers and administrators more vocal about the use of phones in class. In class teachers are more adamant about how there is no reason to have your phones out during class.

Some students seem to be excited about having their own personal laptop to use, but not as excited about the stricter rules surrounding the use of phones in class.

“A lot of students might not have access to devices that fit the school’s rules about being able to be used on campus so I think it’s really good that our schools helping to provide students with those resources especially since our classrooms are so technology heavy.” said Kai Bovik (11)

Teachers too have seemed to be in favor of providing their students with an appropriate device to use in class that’s less likely to distract students.

“I like the idea of disconnecting from phones during class.” Mrs. Dixon said. “Don’t get me wrong, I understand that technology holds an important place in this world and in education, but feel like it can become a distraction during educational time. Even quickly checking a text makes you temporarily shift gears from what you are learning to what is on your phone. It can be hard to shift back,”

Aly Cerda can often be found spending time with friends, seeing live music, and working tirelessly in the clubs they are active in. They have been on the newspaper staff since their sophomore year of high school, and are currently in their senior year as Social Media and PR Editor. Outside of newspaper, they are co-captain of the cheer team, board member of GSA, member of Youth and Government, and Youth Leader for Real Talk. They enjoy being on newspaper, collaborating and using social media as a tool to instantly break news to the public.